Mary Barber

To A Lady, Who Invited The Author Into The Country. - Poem by Mary Barber

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How gladly, Madam, would I go,To see your Gardens, and Chateau;From thence the fine Improvements view,Or walk your verdant Avenue;Delighted, hear the Thrushes sing,Or listen to some bubbling Spring;If Fate had giv'n me Leave to roam!But Citizens must stay at Home.

We're lonesome since you went away,And should be dead--but for our Tea;That Helicon of female Wits,Which fills their Heads with rhyming Fits!This Liquor seldom heats the Brain,But turns it oft, and makes us vain;With Fumes supplies Imagination,Which we mistake for Inspiration.This makes us cramp our Sense in Fetters,And teaze our Friends with chiming Letters.

I grieve your Brother has the Gout;Tho' he's so stoically stout,I've heard him mourn his Loss of Pain,And wish it in his Feet again.What Woe poor Mortals must endure,When Anguish is their only Cure!

STREPHON is ill; and I perceiveHis lov'd Elvira grows so grave,I fear, like Niobe, her MoanWill turn herself and me to Stone.Have I not cause to dread this Fate,Who scarce so much as smile of late?

Whilst lovely Landscapes you survey,And peaceful pass your Hours away,Refresh'd with various blooming Sweets;I'm sick of Smells and dirty Streets,Stiflcd with Smoke, and stunn'd with NoiseOf ev'ry Thing--but my own Boys;Thro' Rounds of plodding doom'd to run,And very seldom see the Sun:Yet sometimes pow'rful Fancy reigns,And glads my Eyes with sylvan Scenes;Where Time, enamour'd, slacks his Pace,Enchanted by the warbling Race;And, in Atonement for his Stay,Thro' Cities hurries on the Day.

O! would kind Heav'n reverse my Fate,Give me to quit a Life I hate,To flow'ry Fields I soon would fly:Let others stay--to cheat and lye.There, in fome blissful Solitude,Where eating Care should ne'er intrude,The Muse should do the Country Right,And paint the glorious Scenes you slight.